The fight against corruption in Kazakhstan is ineffective since the population has no faith in it, believes political science specialist Tolganay Umbetaliyeva. The society firmly believes that the reasons for sending a caught up official to jail lie not in his committing the crime but in his standing in somebody’ way.

Kz.expert has recently published a research called On the History of the Corruption Fighting in Singapore. It demonstrates how this authoritarian-regime country had been able to carry out the effective anti-corruption reforms that, although they did not completely eradicate the bribery practices, managed to bring it down to the tolerable level.

Kazakhstan authorities are trying to fight corruption too but, alas, the attempts are futile. Why? General Director of the Central Asian Foundation for Democracy, political science specialist Tolganay Umbetaliyeva, Ph.D., presents her view of the situation.

— Tolganay, Singapore had managed to win over corruption albeit by using the authoritarian methods. But, in Kazakhstan, even though they do catch the corrupt officials and send them to prison, nothing works. What do you think is the problem?

— Kazakhstan is fighting the results of the corruption but not its causes. The corruption scandals that, from time to time, shake different levels of the Kazakhstan vertical are nothing given the scale of the bribery practices in our country. With that, no one can accuse the authorities of not doing anything, after all they do send people (sometimes even very high-ranked bosses) to jail.

Apart from that, the state is trying to influence the citizens’ mentality. For example, one can see the anti-corruption posters such as «Stop the Corruption» in the public places of Kazakhstan. There is also the state anti-corruption strategy timed to the year 2025 that establishes the generally correct mechanisms that, in time, may even bring results. But, today, they are absolutely ineffective.

— Why?  

— In my opinion, this is because the authorities’ decisions including those on the corruption scandals lack transparency. As a result, the population firmly believes that the reasons why a given official ends up under an anti-corruption investigation lie not in his committing the crime but in his «standing on somebody’s way», «giving a bribe in a bad time», «stealing a lot and sharing nothing», and so forth.

In other words, practically no one in our country believes that the authorities fight the corruption with the desire to solve this problem and that the fighters themselves are honest and faultless people as far as the corruption practices are concerned. Because even the fate of an official who has been caught stealing is usually determined with a bribe: a «present» might help to reduce a prison sentence or to get an early release. Hence the total distrust of the population to all the authorities’ anti-corruption initiatives. 

However, I believe Kazakhstan does have the effective methods of fighting corruption that are worthy of attention. For example, the introduction of the digital document flow which excludes the human factor. This method has brought decent results. For instance, recently, I have obtained new driver’s license via the egov system. I filled in the documents on the website which took me 20 minutes, then, in half an hour, swang by the Public Service Center and picked up the new drivers’ license. Here is another example. The situation with the children placement in kindergartens in those districts of Almaty where the digital work flow is operational is much better, children of 2.5-3 years of age can start attending kindergarten there.

So, the success stories do exist, and I think we should adopt these practices further. Otherwise, given the Kazakhstanis’ wide family ties and their role in the everyday life, the idea of «ties and contacts» in our behavior and the decision-making process will be hard to eradicate.

— Which sphere of life in Kazakhstan is particularly corrupt, in your opinion?

— Judging by the sociological surveys, the population often names the customs, the Ministry of the Interior, the Public Prosecution Office. In other words, the state agencies that are responsible for being compliant with the law and for fighting corruption are believed to be the most corrupt ones. I would also name the governors’ offices that, too, provide social services. There is also the education system (and, in our country, the diploma is more important than the skill) and the health care.

— Could you give an example when innovations really helped to fight corruption in the other countries and explain why these innovations do not work in Kazakhstan?

— First of all, what is important in the fight against corruption is the transparency of the financial operations and all the decisions made on the finances. Second, there must be trust among all the main actors (the state and the financial structures and between them and the population). In our country, the state, being the biggest financial player, dictates the «rules of the game» while the other subjects including the people are forced to obey them.

Due to the fact that the institution of punishment also belongs to the state, the interests and the voices of the other subjects acting or living in this country are completely overlooked and are not even included in the decision-making process. In other words, the interests of the simple folks are not even on the agenda.  

In the other countries, they either «keep in mind» the interests of the other subjects or they are included in the decision-making process which makes the anti-corruption measures more or less effective. The society understands why the state chooses to allocate certain funds to one sphere or another and oversees the spending of these funds. But, in today’s Kazakhstan, something like this is a closely guarded secret to which no one has access. And even if there were an access, no one would understand anything about the matter.

For example, there is absolutely no information on the financing we receive from the international donor organizations. This constitutes our government debt and we do not know how our government spends the money and with what results. There is a big inflow of financial resources in the economy, but there is no information as to where they go and how they are spent.

The same is true for the National Fund of Kazakhstan. From where does the government collect the money? The government promises to make a full report on that but then forgets about it.

This kind of closed and non-transparent financial system has become a fertile ground for breeding corruption in the highest echelons of power. At the local level, the nature of the corruption is different from that at the highest levels, however, one way or another, the entire Kazakhstan society is forced to exist in the heavy atmosphere of total corruption.

— Of course, no country has managed to eradicate corruption completely, but many has been able to bring it down to the socially-tolerable level. What can we in Kazakhstan do to form the conditions when corruption will not affect the interests of the citizens on today’s scale?

— As I have already pointed out, the switch to the digital work flow in the sphere of the public service has proven its effectiveness. The other measures might include the mandatory financial disclosure and the increase of the budget transparency — I mean publicly accessible information on the state finances when any citizen has an opportunity to learn about how the budget is spent.

As for the political measures, I would suggest increasing the public control over the budget spending, granting the public with an opportunity to participate in discussing the budget and its execution.

However, there is another crucial point. We are used to placing all the responsibility on the state or on those in power waiting for them to find a solution. In the meantime, the society is not willing to define its own role in fighting corruption. I believe this is what’s wrong with the situation.

The society, each and every citizen of our country can play an active part in solving the corruption problem. We ourselves can create our living space, the rules that guard our everyday life. And if we keep silent when a policeman, a local administration or public service official hints on a receiving a bribe, not only do we accept these rules but also play an active part in preserving this way of life.

Therefore, I think, first and foremost, the Kazakhstanis must change the way they approach all what is happening around them. We accuse the state authorities, the law-enforcement agencies, etc. of corruption while never blaming ourselves for playing an active part in the corruption schemes at our own level.

There is one more thing. We can see that the state can not solve the problem, but what if the society will be able to find a solution? For example, if we stop being only bystanders who complain on social media about the non-transparent spending of the governmental resources and learn to question the authorities demanding the transparency and the clarity in solving the problems, if we start exercising our rights as the citizens of this country and not wait for the oppositionists or human rights defenders to handle the business.

We must learn to pose these questions before the state ourselves, press the authorities for answering them. Then perhaps we can hope for some changes in our life.

— Thank you for the interview.